compatibilism

[BigMike]

Winning and losing are events which lead to other events.

Winning can be a step to getting money, prestige, fame, influence ...

Losing is a step to something different.

So not irrelevant.

It can be argued that the consequences you mention were not caused by the outcome of the debate. One could just as easily argue that prior events caused the debate's outcome and its subsequent consequences. It is a never-ending chain of causes, not just the final link in the chain. So where is the real cause?

[phyllo]

Winning and losing are events which lead to other events.

Winning can be a step to getting money, prestige, fame, influence ...

Losing is a step to something different.

So not irrelevant.

It can be argued that the consequences you mention were not caused by the outcome of the debate. One could just as easily argue that prior events caused the debate's outcome and its subsequent consequences. It is a never-ending chain of causes, not just the final link in the chain. So where is the real cause?

The "final link" is a critical part of "the chain". Without it, there is no chain.

It is not irrelevant.

[BigMike]

Winning and losing are events which lead to other events.

Winning can be a step to getting money, prestige, fame, influence ...

Losing is a step to something different.

So not irrelevant.

It can be argued that the consequences you mention were not caused by the outcome of the debate. One could just as easily argue that prior events caused the debate's outcome and its subsequent consequences. It is a never-ending chain of causes, not just the final link in the chain. So where is the real cause?

The "final link" is a critical part of "the chain". Without it, there is no chain.

It is not irrelevant.

Winning or losing this debate is irrelevant given that the result was predetermined. Enough said.

[phyllo]

Would anyone else care to demonstrate to me why I ought to think that winning/losing is irrelevant?

Let me up the ante. A child is sexually assaulted. Since it's "predetermined", it's irrelevant whether the child was assaulted or not.

[iambiguous]

Here on this thread [for me] Mary aborting Jane. If some do believe that their own argument regarding either the morality of abortion or their own take on free will, determinism and compatibilism reflects the most rational manner in which to think about the existential relationship between Mary choosing an abortion and her moral responsibility, well, if not an objectivist, what would you call them?

How about 'someone who thinks they are right on an issue, but who does or doesn not have enough support for their position.' Or 'someone you disagree with.' Then you go about arguing why they are wrong or why their evidence or argument is insufficient.

But what I am reacting to is the extent to which I conclude subjectively that, given my own understanding of an objectivist, someone seems to me to be one. It's a judgment call. I'm certainly not arguing that others given their own frame of mind derived from what might be very different lives are obligated to to think and feel the same. Besides, in a determined universe as I understand it, how any of us act or react to anything is objectively...wholly...in accordance with brains wholly in sync with the laws of matter.

You have a somewhat rare use of the word. Your version fits moral objectivist, though it is much more common to call them moral realists.

"Moral realism is the view that there are mind-independent moral facts in the universe, and people can make statements about them that are true or false. For instance, a moral realist might claim that 'killing a defenseless person is wrong' is a fact in the same way that 'two plus two sums to four' is a fact."

"Moral realists are those who think that, in these respects, things should be taken at face value—moral claims do purport to report facts and are true if they get the facts right. Moreover, they hold, at least some moral claims actually are true."

Okay, in regard to Mary and Jane and the morality of abortion [in a free will world] how might a moral realist weigh in?

It's usually associated with Ayn Rand, that is someone who believes in what she called objectivism. I don't think that fits most of the people you label that way. Sometimes, though more rarely, it is used to mean a kind of moral realist. But it seems like it gets applied to anyone who believes anything with too much certainty to you. Even if their certainty is about deteminism or free will without focusing on moral ideas.

With Rand, it wasn't enough to be a moral Objectivist. You had to completely concur in turn with her own moral prescriptions and proscriptions. Or be "excommunicated" from the "collective". How is that different from the moral objectivists here? How is it different from BigMike's own "my way or the highway" assessment of determinism?

But more importantly it's just plain assumed that you must label them and in this case with a term you consider pejorative and make that clear, sometimes, by adding negative adjectives and then connecting the people you call objectivists here with gulag makers and the Taliban for no good reason.

Again, when particular moral objectivists gain power in any community, they can become a threat to those who refuse to toe their line. If that doesn't describe the moral objectivists here, that's good to know. But I can't help but wonder what my own fate would be here if some had the power to ban me. I'm still reminded of Postmodern Beatnik who "banned me for life" over at The Philosophy Forum. No warning, no nothing. Just simply flat out banned me for posting much the same as I post here.

AND NOTE the inherent hypocrisy. You paint them as associated with what you obviously consider evil. Moral realism or what you would clal objectivism is a part of your examples of the Taliban and gulags. Your smearing them does not make sense without your clear implicit condemnation of gulag makers and the Taliban as objectively immoral. The problem with objectivists is that they include these evil people. Without that implicit objectivism, bringing up these groups you consider evil makes no sense.

This is, once again, your own description of me here. I don't call people good or evil. Either because one person's good behavior is another person's evil behavior, or because certain moral nihilists and sociopaths can rationalize any behavior in a No God world or because in a determined universe good and evil are interchangeable.

How about you? What is objectively evil? How would you demonstrate that?

Flannel Jesus asked: But I think a better concern is: why label them at all? Why use a term that is obvious a pejorative one for you, instead of simply disagreeing and challenging their justifications?

I don't agree. I am fractured and fragmented in regard to both the morality of abortion and in regard to free will.

But that's not his point. His point is that you don't seem at all fractured and fragmented in labeling them negatively. Calling them fulminating fanatics. Associating them with people who not only is it clear you think are immoral, but who have committed what many consider to be mass scale crimes against humanity.

Back again to my own entirely existential, subjective reaction to those reacting to me...and your reaction to them. Fine, we can just agree to disagree regarding that. After all, what can we possibly know about each other such that we truly could grasp how and why we react to others as we do?

Again, for me, it comes down to how "for all practical purposes" someone has the actual capacity to harm those who refuse to share their of value judgments:

...down through history there have been any number folks [God and No God] who, once in power, acted out their own rendition of "right makes might". Think sharia law, the Inquisition, the Crusades, fascism, Communism and on and on.

For example, what would you call these folks now in power:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... e-divorce/

"Divorced and remarried, these Afghan women are outlaws under Taliban rule
Taliban law has voided thousands of divorces, experts say, and many remarried women are now considered adulterers"

Though, sure, given free will, if you deem it ridiculous to call these religious fanatics objectivists, fine. Use your own name.

Many of them were probably (ontological) realists also - believing in an external reality. But we don't hear about fanatical fulminating realists. Some were surely dualists. But we don't hear about fanatical fulminating dualists..and so on.

Here I'll wait until I come to grasp more clearly how you distinguish between a moral objectivist and a moral realist in terms of particular contexts.

Perhaps you might consider that being a moral realist isn't insufficient to create mass murderers and sexist monsters. You know this in relation to nihilism and what some of those fringe versions are capable of.

Would the Taliban construe Allah as the font that makes them moral objectivists or moral realists? What "mind independent moral facts in the universe" can they provide to justify what they do?

Take this from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy...

"Moral realists have here been characterized as those who hold that moral claims purport to report facts, that they are evaluable as true or false in light of whether the facts are as the claims purport, and that at least some such claims are actually true."

...and note how it is applicable to the Taliban.

[Flannel Jesus]

Man managed to derail a conversation for 3 pages because he's afraid of people who believe different things than him. Wow. How does a person so afraid of other view points find themselves on a philosophy forum in the first place? This place must be inherently terrifying for someone so fragile.

I'm still keeping tally of the hypocrisy as well. Every post of his has a new one.

[Iwannaplato]

Would anyone else care to demonstrate to me why I ought to think that winning/losing is irrelevant?

Let me up the ante. A child is sexually assaulted. Since it's "predetermined", it's irrelevant whether the child was assaulted or not.

He's not making sense in the greater context of his posts.

Winning or losing this debate is irrelevant given that the result was predetermined. Enough said.

This would mean that any outcome is unimportant since any outcome is predetermined. But elsewhere he has been very concerned with outcomes, for example the outcomes associated with believing in free will.

Well, the outcomes related to believing in free will are predetermined, but this does seem relevant to him.

And, yes, as you asked 'relevant to whom?' and then also 'relevant to what?'

[Flannel Jesus]

Would anyone else care to demonstrate to me why I ought to think that winning/losing is irrelevant?

Let me up the ante. A child is sexually assaulted. Since it's "predetermined", it's irrelevant whether the child was assaulted or not.

He's not making sense in the greater context of his posts.

Winning or losing this debate is irrelevant given that the result was predetermined. Enough said.

This would mean that any outcome is unimportant since any outcome is predetermined. But elsewhere he has been very concerned with outcomes, for example the outcomes associated with believing in free will.

Well, the outcomes related to believing in free will are predetermined, but this does seem relevant to him.

I noticed the same inconsistency. Some determined things apparently don't matter because they're determined, and other determined things apparently do matter - the reason for their exception is unclear

[Iwannaplato]

I noticed the same inconsistency. Some determined things apparently don't matter because they're determined, and other determined things apparently do matter - the reason for their exception is unclear

It's hard, of course, not to end up contradicting oneself when dealing with things that sit in our bones so deeply. But I've had that reaction a few times to his posts. I understand where they are coming from, but in the greater picture of his model/position/other posts, there's a contradiction.

[Flannel Jesus]

I noticed the same inconsistency. Some determined things apparently don't matter because they're determined, and other determined things apparently do matter - the reason for their exception is unclear

It's hard, of course, not to end up contradicting oneself when dealing with things that sit in our bones so deeply. But I've had that reaction a few times to his posts. I understand where they are coming from, but in the greater picture of his model/position/other posts, there's a contradiction.

I totally understand both intuitions as well, that determined things "don't matter" and yet that things still seem to matter anyway. The solution requires a bit more nuance than just a blanket "things don't matter if they're determined"

[Iwannaplato]

I totally understand both intuitions as well, that determined things "don't matter" and yet that things still seem to matter anyway. The solution requires a bit more nuance than just a blanket "things don't matter if they're determined"

As determinists, we must accept that no one has free will, that moral responsibility is a myth, and that we must be guided by reason, like a social contract, and not by the nonsense of free will. And we must make sure that society does its part by meeting “their basic needs, and advance their well-being”.

Why must we?
It sounds very much like believing in determinism is winning and believing in free will is losing. Or, better put, that there is something parallel here.

He earlier tells Phyllo that winning the debate

It can be argued that the consequences you mention were not caused by the outcome of the debate

Well, it can be argued that the consequences of believing in determinism and the consequences of believing in free will were not caused the beliefs themselves or the believers, but by something way back in time (the Big Bang, even).
But many of his arguments center on this idea of the importance of believing in determinism and implicitly that it is relevant to some good.

It seems like he has been arguing that winning (as in improving society) depends on having the correct belief, which is also one that has better consequences. Otherwise pointing out all the bad consequences of believing in free will would have been pointless.

Something matters, as you say, at least to him.

[iambiguous]

If some do believe that their own argument regarding either the morality of abortion or their own take on free will, determinism and compatibilism reflects the most rational manner in which to think about the existential relationship between Mary choosing an abortion and her moral responsibility, well, if not an objectivist, what would you call them?

The term that might best describe someone who believes that their own argument regarding the morality of abortion or the nature of free will, determinism, and compatibilism reflects the most rational manner to think about the existential relationship between Mary choosing an abortion and her moral responsibility would be a "subjectivist."

Okay, you believe we live in a no free will determined universe. How then is your brain not compelling you to believe this? In other words, if you were never able to not to believe it how is this not, given the laws of matter, the only belief you were ever able to have?

You believe that Mary is morally responsible. You believe that Mary is not morally responsible. But either way you were never able to opt to believe otherwise. That's the part that I come back to. In a wholly determined universe how is everything we believe not inherently embedded in the one "laws of matter" objective truth?

Which takes us back to the human brain being the one exception. Which takes us back to what we still don't know about mindless matter "somehow" evolving into biological matter evolving [eventually] into us.

[iambiguous]

Right. Ayn Rand believed in capitalism. Karl Marx believed in Communism. Adolph Hitler believed in the Final Solution. The Taliban believe in Allah. The Pope believes in Catholicism.

So, historically, what has often happened when those who believe in something gained power and had the capacity to insist that others must believe the same thing...or else? Again, I call them objectivists and, subjectively, I suggest that they are dangerous to those who believe instead in, say, democracy and the rule of law.

Absolutely, you're right, people who have any belief at all are always comparable to people like Hitler. Having any belief of any sort means you want to use politics and violence to force other people to believe that. People who believe that 2+2 equals 4 are Nazis basically. That is a completely rational thing for you to believe.

WAIT, BELIEVE? You believe that? That means you believe something. You fucking Nazi.

Do you see how absurd this line of reasoning is?

Absolutely shameless.

Unless, of course, he's off the hook.



Seriously though -- click -- it still rather amazes me how I am able to reduce otherwise intelligent human beings down to declamatory outbursts of this sort.

Anyway, he's all yours.

[Flannel Jesus]

Right. Ayn Rand believed in capitalism. Karl Marx believed in Communism. Adolph Hitler believed in the Final Solution. The Taliban believe in Allah. The Pope believes in Catholicism.

So, historically, what has often happened when those who believe in something gained power and had the capacity to insist that others must believe the same thing...or else? Again, I call them objectivists and, subjectively, I suggest that they are dangerous to those who believe instead in, say, democracy and the rule of law.

Absolutely, you're right, people who have any belief at all are always comparable to people like Hitler. Having any belief of any sort means you want to use politics and violence to force other people to believe that. People who believe that 2+2 equals 4 are Nazis basically. That is a completely rational thing for you to believe.

WAIT, BELIEVE? You believe that? That means you believe something. You fucking Nazi.

Do you see how absurd this line of reasoning is?

Absolutely shameless.

Unless, of course, he's off the hook.



Seriously though -- click -- it still rather amazes me how I am able to reduce otherwise intelligent human beings down to declamatory outbursts of this sort.

Anyway, he's all yours.

I mocked your hypocrisy so that means you win

Amazing world view you have, one of a kind.

[iambiguous]

I can see where you both are coming from. Iambiguous seems to be pointing out that when people with strong beliefs gain power and use that power to force others to adopt their beliefs, it can lead to dangerous and oppressive situations. On the other hand, Flannel Jesus is highlighting the absurdity of equating any belief with the extremist and violent beliefs of Hitler and the Taliban.

Just for the record, I challenge anyone to note where I have argued that having any belief at all makes you Hitler or the Taliban. That even believing 2 + 2 = 4 makes you a Nazi.

Instead, I have noted that historically, those I construe to be "my way or the highway" objectivists have gained power in particular communities [God or No God] and demanded of others that they "toe the line".

Or else. And here all the way up from reeducation camps and the gulags to the gas chambers.

Also, that in regard to moral nihilists as some construe the Vladimir Putins and the Xi Jinpings and the "show me the money" global capitalists of the world to be, they can also demand total allegiance to the powers that be.

This thread, on the other hand, focuses more on the quandary that revolves around a human brain some argue is wholly in sync with the laws of matter, being able to argue [and then demonstrate] that any belief at all is not a compelled belief.